'We have got Boswell's Tour to the Hebrides, and are to have his Life of Johnson.'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Jane Austen Print: Book
'Weeton's reading becomes important in communication with friends, but also a point of conflict: when she visits her brother and his wife, they complain that she spends all her time reading, though she insists that she read very little ("only... Gil Blas, now and then a newspaper, two or three of Lady M. W. Montagu's letters, and few pages in a magazine'), and only because her hosts rose so late. Since her literacy is important as a sign of status, she repeatedly presents herself not as a reader of low status texts like novels but of travels, education works, memoirs and letters, including Boswell's "Tour of the Hebrides", the Travels of Mungo Park, and Mme de Genlis' work. She approves some novels, like Hamilton's "The Cottagers of Glenburnie", but generally finds them a "dangerous, facinating kind of amusement" which "destroy all relish for useful, instructive studies'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Ellen Weeton Print: Book
Commenced Boswell's Life of Johnson and was much pleased with it.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: John Horrocks Ainsworth Print: Book
Dined at five - went on with Boswell having discontinued it, since Saturday January 23rd.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: John Horrocks Ainsworth Print: Book
'As a circuit preacher Pyke introduced farm people to Milton, Carlyle, Ruskin and Tolstoy. His own reading ranged from Shakespeare and Boswell to Shelley's poems and George Henry Lewes's History of Philosophy. He was even prepared to acknowledge the "genius" of Jude the Obscure, though he would have preferred a happy ending'.
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Richard Pyke Print: Book
'Philip Inman conveyed a ... specific sense of the uses of literacy for an early Labour MP. The son of a widowed charwoman, he bought up all the cheap reprints he could afford and kept notes on fifty-eight of them... There were Emerson's essays, Ruskin's Sesame and Lilies, Holmes's Autocrat of the Breakfast Table, Lamb's Essays of Elia, classic biogaphies (Boswell on Johnson, Lockhart on Scott, Carlyle on Sterling), several Waverley novels, Wuthering Heights, Don Quixote, Robinson Crusoe, Pilgrim's Progress, The Imitation of Christ, Shakespeare's sonnets, Tennyson, Browning, William Morris and Palgrave's Golden Treasury.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Philip Inman Print: Book
'Jack Common recalled that his mother brought him a secondhand and severely abridged "Life of Johnson" for 1d., and he had to read it several times before he even partially absorbed it'.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Jack Common Print: Book
Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal, Saturday 30 August 1800: 'I read a little of Boswell's Life of Johnson.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Dorothy Wordsworth Print: Book
Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal, Sunday 14 September 1800: 'Read Boswell in the house in the morning, and after dinner under the bright yellow leaves of the orchard.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Dorothy Wordsworth Print: Book
Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal, Sunday 14 September 1800: 'Read Boswell in the house in the morning, and after dinner under the bright yellow leaves of the orchard.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Dorothy Wordsworth Print: Book
Began Dr Johnson's tour to the Hebrides, A journey to the western Isles of scotland... My aunt and I read aloud the evening service.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Anne Lister Print: Book
?Boswell showed his genius in setting forth Johnson?s weaknesses as well as his strength. But if Boswell had been Johnson?s brother? I cannot be simply eulogistic if the portrait is to be lifelike; but I find it very hard to speak of defects without either concealing my opinion that they were defects. Or on the other hand, taking a tone of superiority & condescension.?
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Leslie Stephen Print: Book
Books lately read: A Journal of a tour to the Hebrides with Dr Johnson, by James Boswell, Esq. J. Boswell does appear so wonderfully simple, so surprisingly ingenuous, that I cannot but smile as I read his work...
Century: 1700-1799 / 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Ellen Weeton Print: Book
'I have been reading Boswell's Life of Johnson which is very entertaining; I never saw Johnson's Journey to the Hebrides or Western Islands, I suppose it is an amusing Book.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Robert Sharp Print: Book
'Recd a parcel from William last night. I was at the time reading Boswell's Life of Johnson, but it was immediately laid down, for the entertainment I anticipated, from hearing how Cobbett stood...'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Robert Sharp Print: Book
H. J. Jackson discusses Leigh Hunt's responsive annotations, including personal reminiscences and observations, as well as critical remarks, to his copy of James Boswell's Life of Johnson.
Century: 1800-1849 / 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: James Leigh Hunt Print: Book
"Fulke Greville's copy of Boswell [Life of Johnson] stands out among individual copies annotated by readers who had known Boswell or Johnson or other members of their circle ... offering facts or interpretations of events that may be at odds with the text and that supplement it in useful ways."
Century: 1700-1799 / 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Fulke Greville Print: Book
H. J. Jackson discusses annotations of unidentified male reader in 1793 copy of Boswell's Life of Johnson; this reader, referred to in annotations as "Mr L", known to be from Lichfield, twenty years Johnson's junior, and also a pupil at Lichfield Grammar School and student at Pembroke College, Oxford; annotations date from 1793 to 1800.
Century: 1700-1799 / 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mr L. Print: Book
H. J. Jackson notes John Gibson Lockhart's annotations, including personal reminiscences in response to sections of text, in his copy of James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson.
Century: 1800-1849 / 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: John Gibson Lockhart Print: Book
"An unknown reader inclined to be sarcastic at Boswell's expense in a British Library copy of the 1829 edition [of the Life of Johnson] ... goes to some pains to record a moment of agreement with Johnson's protest ' [...] What is climate to happiness? Place me in the heart of Asia, should I not be exiled?' This the reader confirms by his own example: '15th Novr on the Nile -- how often have I found this realised' (p.198)."
Century: 1800-1849 / 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: anon Print: Book
H. J. Jackson notes unknown reader's marginal contradiction of assertion of Samuel Johnson that a dog will be as likely to take a small piece of meat as a large one, when presented wth both, recorded in James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson.
Century: Reader/Listener/Group: anon Print: Book
H. J. Jackson on readers' responses in annotations to Samuel Johnson's comment that the letter H seldom begins any but the first syllable of a word, recorded by James Boswell in the Life of Samuel Johnson:
"A Cambridge University Library copy of the first edition annotated in at least four hands has in the margin at that point a list of words that would appear to refute Johnson's statement: 'Shepherd / Cowherd / Abhor / Behave / Uphold / Exhaust' (1: 166)."
Century: Reader/Listener/Group: anon Print: Book
H. J. Jackson discusses copious annotations made in 2-volume first-edition (1791) copy of James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson, which signed "Scriblerus" (who Jackson identifies as Fulke Greville), commenting: "[Scriblerus] evidently read the Life, or at least dipped into it, more than once: a summary note from the end of his first reading is dated November 1791, but other notes include dates in 1792 and 1797."
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Fulke Greville Print: Book
H. J. Jackson discusses copious annotations made in 2-volume first-edition (1791) copy of James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson, which signed "Scriblerus" (who Jackson identifies as Fulke Greville), commenting: "[Scriblerus] evidently read the Life, or at least dipped into it, more than once: a summary note from the end of his first reading is dated November 1791, but other notes include dates in 1792 and 1797."
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Fulke Greville Print: Book
H. J. Jackson discusses copious annotations made in 2-volume first-edition (1791) copy of James Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson, which signed "Scriblerus" (who Jackson identifies as Fulke Greville), commenting: "[Scriblerus] evidently read the Life, or at least dipped into it, more than once: a summary note from the end of his first reading is dated November 1791, but other notes include dates in 1792 and 1797."
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Fulke Greville Print: Book
'We are reading in the evenings now, Sydney Smith's letters, Boswell, Whewell's History of Inductive Sciences, the Odyssey and occasionally Heine's Reisebilder. I began the second Book of the Iliad in Greek this morning'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: George Eliot and G.H. Lewes Print: BookManuscript: Unknown
'In the course of my very desultory readings, I perused "Boswell's Life of Dr Johnson"; which I still consider to be a very amusing and very instructive piece of biography.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas Carter Print: Book
' ... he [ie George III] paid attention when books were read to him, and asked for excerpts from Boswell's "Life of Johnson" ...'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: King George III Print: Book
'I have been reading the "Life of Dr. Johnson", and in a letter of his to a friend on the death of his mother I found the following passage, which reminded me of a resolve made some time ago, but forgotten.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Donald William Alers Hankey Print: Book
'It was about noon, and the officers had all gone home to their dinners, when, as I sat on my stool munching my loaf and reading Boswell's "Life of Dr Johnson", I heard a shuffling of feet outside and my cell-door was thrown open by the patrol'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: anon Print: Book
'Pursued Boswell's "life of Johnson"....'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas Green Print: Book
'Dipped into Boswell's "Life of Johnson". Johnson pronounces Hume either mad or a liar...'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Thomas Green Print: Book
'Just now I am reading nightly in bed Boswell?s "Life of Johnson". I suppose you know it by heart. Without doubt it is the most agreeable & diverting thing in non-imaginative literature in English.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Arnold Bennett Print: Book
'I have read since last October a good deal of the history relating to the East ...: not much of books not connected with India [but included] Boswell's "Life of Johnson; ...'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mountstuart Elphinstone Print: Book
'Tuesday May 23rd. [...] Read Boswell's Life of Johnson.'
[records of reading this text also appear in entries for 24, 25, 26, 27, 28 May 1820]
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Claire Clairmont Print: Book
'Read Boswell's life of Johnson'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary Shelley Print: Book
'Read Livy - finish Life of Johnson'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary Shelley Print: Book
Elizabeth Barrett to Hugh Stuart Boyd, 10 July 1832:
'Mr Croker has lately published an edition of Boswell's Life of Johnson. I have been looking over
it, and do not think his additions & notes of much value. But he is impartial, -- which is a
wonderful merit in an editor.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Elizabeth Barrett Print: Book
[Mary Shelley's reading list for 1820, with texts also read by Percy Shelley marked with an x. Only texts not mentioned in the journal are given separate entries based on this list]
'M. (& (S with an x) - 1820
The remainder of Livy.
x The Bible until the end of Ezekhiel
x Don Juan
x Travels Before the Flood
La Nouvelle Heloise
The Fable of the Bees
Paine's Works
Utopia
x Voltaire's Memoires
x The Aenied [sic] And Georgics
Bridone's Travels
Robinson Crusoe
Sandford & Merton
x Astronomy in the Encyclopaedia
Vindication of the Rights of women
x Boswell's life of Johnson
Paradise regained & lost
Mary - Letters from Norway & Posthumus [sic] Works
Ivanhoe - Tales of my Landlord
Fleetwood - Caleb Williams
x Ricciardetto.
x Mrs Macauly's [sic] Hist. of Engd
x Lucretius
The 3 first orations of Cicero
Muratori Anti chita [sic] d'Italia
Travels & Rebellion in Ireland
Tegrino's life of Castruccio
x Boccacio [sic] - Decamerone
x Keats' poems
x armata
Corinne
The first book of Homer. Oedippus [sic] Tyrannus
A Little Spanish & much Italian.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Percy Bysshe Shelley Print: Book
'I have read Boswell I am sure ten times - & hope to read it many more it is the most amusing book in the world, besides that I do love the kind hearted wise & Gentle Bear - & think him as loveable a [Man] friend as a profound philosopher'
[letter to John Murray, who had just published a new edition of Boswell's Life Of Johnson that Mary was keen to possess]
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary Shelley Print: Book
'You talk of reading "a very old book": Boswell's Tour to the Hebrides. Why that's a [underlined] chickn [sic, underlined] compared to my present reading. I am reduced to a perusal of my own little library, and am solacing myself with Plutarch's Lives, and Robertson's History of Charles V. and vary my sport occasionally with an Historical Play of Shakespear, or a good Sunday Book.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Anna Grosvenor Print: Book
' - I read Boswell's tour in the Hebrides and speculate agreeably on the probable difference between Boswell's conception of the Hebrides and yours - '
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Vita Sackville-West Print: Book
'Fortunately Peter had lots of reading matter and he loaned me "Doctor Johnson".'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Frank Smythe Print: Book
'[referring to a dispute over whether Johnson wrote certain papers in "The Adventurer"] Mrs Williams told me that, "as he had [italics] given [end italics] those Essays to Dr Bathurst, who sold them at two guineas each, he never would own them; nay, he used to say that he did not [italics] write [end italics] them: but the fact was, that he [italics] dictated [end italics] them,while Bathurst wrote". I read to him Mrs Williams's account; he smiled, and said nothing'.
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: James Boswell Manuscript: Unknown
'He kept the greater part of mine [letters] very carefully; and a short time before his death was attentive enough to seal them up in bundles, and ordered them to be delivered to me, which was accordingly done. Amongst them I found one, of which I had not made a copy, and which I own I read with pleasure at the distance of twenty years. It is dated November, 1765, at the palace of Pascal Paoli, in Corte, the capital of Corsica, and is full of generous enthusiasm. After giving a sketch of what I had seen and heard in that island, it proceeded thus: "I dare to call this a spirited tour. I dare to challenge your approbation."'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: James Boswell Manuscript: Letter
'[Letter from Johnson to Boswell] I have now three parcels of Lord Hailes's history, which I purpose to return all the next week: that his respect for my little observations should keep his work in suspense makes one of the evils of my journey. It is in our language, I think, a new mode of history which tells all that is wanted, and, I suppose, all that is known, without laboured splendour of language, or affected subtilty of conjecture. The exactness of his dates raises my wonder. He seems to have the closeness of Renault without his constraint.
Mrs. Thrale was so entertained with your [italics] Journal [end italics] that she almost read herself blind. She has a great regard for you'.
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Hester Lynch Thrale Manuscript: Unknown
'Dr. Johnson and Mr. Wilkes talked of the contested passage in Horace's "Art of Poetry", "[italics] Difficile est proprie communia dicere.[end italics]' Mr. Wilkes according to my note, gave the interpretation thus; "It is difficult to speak with propriety of common things; as, if a poet had to speak of Queen Caroline drinking tea, he must endeavour to avoid the vulgarity of cups and saucers". But upon reading my note, he tells me that he meant to say, that "the word [italics]communia [end italics], being a Roman law term, signifies here things [italics]communis juris [end italics], that is to say, what have never yet been treated by any body; and this appears clearly from what followed,
"[italics]--Tuque
Rectius Iliacum carmen deducis in actus
Quam si proferres ignota indictaque primus." [end italics]
"You will easier make a tragedy out of the Iliad than on any subject not handled before".'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: John Wilkes Manuscript: Unknown
' [letter from Sir Alexander Dick to Johnson] I had yesterday the honour of receiving your book of your "Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland", which you was so good as to send me, by the hands of our mutual friend, Mr. Boswell, of Auchinleck; for which I return you my most hearty thanks; and after carefully reading it over again, shall deposit in my little collection of choice books, next our worthy friend's "Journey to Corsica". As there are many things to admire in both performances, I have often wished that no Travels or Journeys should be published but those undertaken by persons of integrity and capacity to judge well, and describe faithfully, and in good language, the situation, condition, and manners of the countries past through.'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Alexander Dick Print: Book
'I idle finely. I read Boswell’s "Life of Johnson"[…]'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Robert Louis Stevenson Print: Book
'[Letter from Johnson to Boswell] 'I have just advanced so far towards recovery as to read a pamphlet; and you may reasonably suppose that the first pamphlet which I read was yours. I am very much of your opinion, and, like you, feel great indignation at the indecency with which the King is every day treated. Your paper contains very considerable knowledge of history and of the constitution, very properly produced and applied. It will certainly raise your character, though perhaps it may not make you a Minister of State.'
Century: 1700-1799 Reader/Listener/Group: Samuel Johnson
The Earl of Aberdeen to John Wilson Croker, in response to a query regarding quotation from Homer by Thucydides, 1 September 1846:
'I should have answered your letter sooner, but I had not a copy of the Life of Johnson at hand; and before writing to you, I wished to see the passage to which you refer.
'From the expressions of Johnson, it would appear that he thought the lines quoted by Thucydides were from the Iliad or Odyssey, in which case they certainly would not be found in any of our copies. But the quotation is from the hymn to Apollo. It is in the third book of his history, and in that part of it in which he gives an account of the extraordinary and barbarous proceeding, called by the Athenians the purification of Delos.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Earl of Aberdeen Print: Book
John Wilson Croker to Lord Brougham (1850-51):
'And so you are reading my Bozzy'.
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Henry Brougham Print: Book
From the 1806-1840 Commonplace book of an unknown reader. 'In the following lines, by that pious and most excellent of men, Dr Johnson, we are consoled with the assurance that happiness may be attained if we "apply our hearts" to piety' Transcribes poem beginning "Where then shall hope and fear their object find? / Shall dull suspense corrupt the stagnant mind?..." and ends '1749- aged 40.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: anon Print: Book
Lady Harriet Cavendish to her former governess, Selina Trimmer, 9 November 1803:
'I have at present a [italics]Johnson[end italics] mania upon me, which I hope you will allow is better than a [italics]novel[end italics] one. I have been [italics]re[end italics]-reading Mrs. Piozzi and Boswell. The latter I think very entertaining, and it is so long since I had read it that I had almost forgotten it. I have hardly patience with Boswell's conceit and pride and wish he would fancy himself a secondary personage [French], as he almost always prefers telling one what he thought and did, to Johnson, and he is too uninteresting to make it ever excusable.'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Lady Harriet Cavendish Print: Book
Lady Harriet Cavendish to her former governess, Selina Trimmer, 9 November 1803:
'I have at present a [italics]Johnson[end italics] mania upon me, which I hope you will allow is better than a [italics]novel[end italics] one. I have been [italics]re[end italics]-reading Mrs. Piozzi and Boswell. The latter I think very entertaining, and it is so long since I had read it that I had almost forgotten it. I have hardly patience with Boswell's conceit and pride and wish he would fancy himself a secondary personage [French], as he almost always prefers telling one what he thought and did, to Johnson, and he is too uninteresting to make it ever excusable.'
Century: 1700-1799 / 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Lady Harriet Cavendish Print: Book
Mary Shelley to John Murray, acknowledging his gift of Croker's edition of Boswell's Life of Johnson (1831):
'I have read "Boswell's Journal" ten times: I hope to read it many more. It is the most amusing book in the world [...] I do not see, in your list of authors whose anecdotes are extracted, the name of Mrs. D'Arblay; her account of Dr. Johnson, Mrs. Thrale, &c., in her "Memoirs of Dr. Burney," are highly interesting and valuable [sic].'
Century: 1800-1849 Reader/Listener/Group: Mary Shelley Print: Book
'The evening was then devoted to Samuel Johnson as seen through the biography of Boswell. Two papers were contributed.
By Mr Burrow on "a Second Hand Book" which threw an interesting sidelight on Dr Johnson
& By H.R. Smith who gave us an interesting account of the biographer.
Readings from the biography were given by Mr Rawlings, Mr Unwin, Mr Evans & Mr Wallis, Mr Robson'.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Alfred Rawlings Print: Book
'The evening was then devoted to Samuel Johnson as seen through the biography of Boswell. Two papers were contributed.
By Mr Burrow on "a Second Hand Book" which threw an interesting sidelight on Dr Johnson
& By H.R. Smith who gave us an interesting account of the biographer.
Readings from the biography were given by Mr Rawlings, Mr Unwin, Mr Evans & Mr Wallis, Mr Robson'.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Ernest E. Unwin Print: Book
'The evening was then devoted to Samuel Johnson as seen through the biography of Boswell. Two papers were contributed.
By Mr Burrow on "a Second Hand Book" which threw an interesting sidelight on Dr Johnson
& By H.R. Smith who gave us an interesting account of the biographer.
Readings from the biography were given by Mr Rawlings, Mr Unwin, Mr Evans & Mr Wallis, Mr Robson'.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Reginald Robson Print: Book
'The evening was then devoted to Samuel Johnson as seen through the biography of Boswell. Two papers were contributed.
By Mr Burrow on "a Second Hand Book" which threw an interesting sidelight on Dr Johnson
& By H.R. Smith who gave us an interesting account of the biographer.
Readings from the biography were given by Mr Rawlings, Mr Unwin, Mr Evans & Mr Wallis, Mr Robson'.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Charles Evans Print: Book
'The evening was then devoted to Samuel Johnson as seen through the biography of Boswell. Two papers were contributed.
By Mr Burrow on "a Second Hand Book" which threw an interesting sidelight on Dr Johnson
& By H.R. Smith who gave us an interesting account of the biographer.
Readings from the biography were given by Mr Rawlings, Mr Unwin, Mr Evans & Mr Wallis, Mr Robson'.
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Henry Marriage Wallis Print: Book
'His reading in 1938 and 1939 had been mainly of memoirs and autobiographies:
Boswell, Greville, Logan Pearsall Smith's Unforgotten Years, Siegfried Sassoon's The
Old Century, Somerset Maugham's The Summing-Up ("a very honest confession of
faith").'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: John Buchan Print: Book
'Meeting held at Gower Cottage. 8th May ’43
Muriel Stevens in the Chair
1. Minutes of last meeting read & signed
[...]
3. Knox Taylor opened our study of Johnson & his Circle by giving us a most
comprehensive picture of the background of this period.
4. Howard Smith told us of Johnson’s life and publications.
5. Isabel Taylor read Johnson’s famous letter to Lord Chesterfield.
6. Roger Moore read ‘The Wedding Day’ by Boswell & an account of his first
meeting with Johnson.
7. F. E. Pollard described Johnson’s Circle. He spoke of Garrick, Sir Joshua
Reynolds, Burke, Goldsmith, Boswell, Richardson, Fielding, Mrs. Thrale and her
daughter Hester & others and A. B Dilks read from Johnson’s “Vanity of Human
Wishes.”
8. Mention must be made of the excellent refreshments provided by our hostess
and the Secretary regrets that owing to lack of time, she has in these minutes
done Scant justice to a most thoughtfully prepared & extremely interesting
evening.
[signed as a true record by] Howard R Smith
22/6/43 [at the club meeting held at Frensham: see Minute Book, p. 155: ‘We
adjourned indoors & the minutes of the last meeting were read, corrected and
signed.’]'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Roger Moore Print: Book
'Meeting held at Gower Cottage. 8th May ’43
Muriel Stevens in the Chair
1. Minutes of last meeting read & signed
[...]
3. Knox Taylor opened our study of Johnson & his Circle by giving us a most
comprehensive picture of the background of this period.
4. Howard Smith told us of Johnson’s life and publications.
5. Isabel Taylor read Johnson’s famous letter to Lord Chesterfield.
6. Roger Moore read ‘The Wedding Day’ by Boswell & an account of his first
meeting with Johnson.
7. F. E. Pollard described Johnson’s Circle. He spoke of Garrick, Sir Joshua
Reynolds, Burke, Goldsmith, Boswell, Richardson, Fielding, Mrs. Thrale and her
daughter Hester & others and A. B Dilks read from Johnson’s “Vanity of Human
Wishes.”
8. Mention must be made of the excellent refreshments provided by our hostess
and the Secretary regrets that owing to lack of time, she has in these minutes
done Scant justice to a most thoughtfully prepared & extremely interesting
evening.
[signed as a true record by] Howard R Smith
22/6/43 [at the club meeting held at Frensham: see Minute Book, p. 155: ‘We
adjourned indoors & the minutes of the last meeting were read, corrected and
signed.’]'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Roger Moore Print: Book
'Meeting held at 22 Cintra Avenue 4th September 1943
F. E. Pollard in the chair.
1. The minutes of the last meeting were read and approved.
[...]
6. Edith Smith opened the evening of miscellaneous readings by reading part of a
short story “The Man with No Face” by Dorothy Sayers. She left the murder
mystery tantalizingly unsolved, but gave us a clever and amusing picture of the
occupants rightful and encroaching of a 1st-class railway carriage.
7. Mary Stansfield read from a collection of letters written by Freya Stark entitled
“Letters from Syria”. These were written some years ago in an atmosphere of
peace & tranquility. A particularly beautiful description of the writer’s first sight of
the Greek Islands recalled to F. E. Pollard his voyage there with Charles
Stansfield, about which he gave us some interesting and amusing reminiscences.
8. Arnold Joselin Read Boswells account of his first meeting with Johnson and then
“My Streatham Visit” by Frances Burney in which she describes meeting Johnson at
Thrale Hall and records some of the conversation at the dinner table.
9. [...] we listened to F. E. Pollard reading about “The Functional Alternative” from
a pamphlet published by the Royal Institute of International Affairs entitled “A
Working Peace System” by David Mitrany. The author suggests that in Post-War
Europe we should pursue a line of action similar to that adopted by President
Roosevelt in America in 1932/33. This started a lively discussion during which it
became apparent that federal union does not function in the Pollard family.
10. Reverting to more tranquil times Howard Smith read from André Maurois’ “Life
of Disraeli”. This led to the suggestion that Parliamentary speeches of today might
be improved if they contained more personal venom & we were assured that
Eleanor Rathbone is doing her best to liven things up.
11. Muriel Stevens read from The Autobiography of a Chinese Girl” by Hsieh Ping-
Ying. This proved to be a suitably soothing and uncontroversial ending to a most
varied and interesting evening.
[signed as a true record by] Howard R. Smith
6/10/1943 [at the club meeting held at Frensham: see Minute Book, p. 161]'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Arnold Joselin Print: Book
'He [Mr Ritchie] presented me with a fascinating work as a birthday present — Boswell's "Letters" — you can't think how entertaining they are.'
Century: 1850-1899 Reader/Listener/Group: Gertrude Bell Print: Book
(1) '...also dipped often into Boswell's "Life of Johnson". Being entirely made up of conversation I
don't think it is a book to be read continuously, tho' it is very good fun in bits.' (2) 'I have been
dipping into Boswell, whom I grow to like better and better.'
Century: 1900-1945 Reader/Listener/Group: Clive Staples Lewis Print: Book
